Temptation is not an object of outward desire, not a prize to be won. It is a private emptiness yearning to be filled.
~ From the early writings of Lor Tahmita, heretic
THE LIBRARY WAS ALWAYS serious—how could it be otherwise with doomed Ormande’s portrait and all the much more evocative portraits of his demonic enemy peering over our desperate shoulders—but this night it crossed the boundary to dismal.
Zik had stayed with Nenzo, and Imbril had yet to arrive, so it was only the prince, the lady, the hartier, and the thief gathered in the gloom. With Zik occupied elsewhere, no one had refilled and properly placed the lamps, so the gloom was very real as well as spiritual.
Lisel and I gathered the guttering lights closer to the work table while Dyania bent beside Aric to review the scrolls he’d studied.
In the murk, his low voice was a deep murmur and the lady’s was a crystal-clear chime in answer. They were so perfectly matched: her sunlit skin and black braids, shot with the hueless patches, him like moonlight and shadows with the pale marks of his scars, her eyes dark and light, both bright, his like terrible secrets iced over.
Jealousy and longing were hotter than molten earthbone.
With a glance at them and keeping her voice down so as not to disturb their matching perfection, Lisel asked, “Why are you hissing?”
“I wasn’t.” I let out the rest of my pent-up breath to make sure I wasn’t. I thumped a lamp on the heavy wood, the slop of oil making the flame dance wildly. “I…burned myself.”
That part was true enough, though it wasn’t this hot glass and metal that singed.
Dyania looked up. “You burned yourself, Fei? Do you need a poultice?”
“No. It’s not that bad.” I looked away from the prince.
But Lisel was already leading us back there to look at the scrolls. “Now say it again like I can’t read ancient Maru.”
The prince pointed out several depictions of the bloodfire rune. “The island of Taelleroc had a rare sort of shell made by a creature that they said spun its own ichor into purest crystal.” He shook his head. “The alchemical properties could not be at all the same, but the nature of the substance isn’t important. What matters is that the spun ichor was impermeable, and the crystal shells could be sealed with the heart’s blood within, preserving the power of the auric resonance.” The prince tapped the scroll. “Here is an account of the islanders gathering and distilling auras to seal them into the crystal shells, although the particulars of the technique aren’t spelled out.”
He shuffled through to a sheaf of parchments, almost as brittle as the scrolls. “This one is from a lor traveling through Xabhad a hundred years before the Great Gorging who writes of reliquaries ‘more brilliant than the brightest sands of the Xab’ that held auras to wield against the demons. Again, the precise methods aren’t recorded. The lor called them luminarci, and says since gold doesn’t tarnish or rot, these reliquaries wouldn’t crumble to dust like our own mortal form. Unfortunately, as far as I’ve read, none of the shells or reliquaries remain, apparently stolen and stripped for the gold and gemstones.” He slanted a sly glance at me.
I pulled my lips to one side. “I still don’t see the reason why these reliquaries were needed,” I complained. “As I said before, our bodies serve as fine vessels for auras, for as long as they last, I suppose. And it’s not like anyone wants the ability to lure a horde, except maybe to gather demons for the dragon, as happened with the bloodfire rune in Velderrey.”
“Were the luminarci a lure? Or a weapon or a defense?” The prince shuffled through the rest of the scrolls, pulling one particularly dusty roll toward him. He didn’t try to unspool it—just as well since it looked like it might follow the same fate as Ormonde’s bone with another read or two—just hovered one hand above it. “There’s a passage here, but…” His brow furrowed just the slightest in doubt. “It was a complicated translation from an extinct freeheld travelers’ tongue that was itself supposedly about a recitation of an old Taelle poem which makes me question the veracity.”
“Tricky,” I said. “People think thieves are bad, but poets are the absolute worst liars, I say.”
The prince grunted but didn’t deny the allegation. “And then, even worse, it became a chant in rhyming couplets as part of a children’s rhythm game. The poem celebrates the exploits of the great aunt of Ormonde’s half-sister in her battle against the demons.” He closed his eyes and began to recite.
“Blazing with ecstatic light,
She enshrined a balm against the blight,
Aura bright to brave the dark
To free the shadow from its heart.
And come each night again she spins
A thread to bind the light within.”
We all sat in silence for a moment, or maybe it was only me mesmerized by the lyrical depths of his recitation. From his lips, the words spiraled out, creating a vision of that ancient world and the mighty lady with glowing orbs of her own spiritual vitality, gathered for the battle…and of little children dancing to her memory.
“Impossible,” came the harsh judgment. “Not to mention foolish and dangerous and a waste of precious auric power.”
I jerked my head up along with everyone else and swiveled to see the numinlor glowering at us from the library doorway, Imbril lurking behind her with his fingers tangled into a remorseful knot. When I glared at him, he only looked away. Not that I precisely blamed him; in a fury as she was now, Kalima was an imposing force of her own.
“What are you doing here while the dragon gnaws at its fraying leash?” Kalima glared at the prince while I cast another hard look at Imbril, who gave me the smallest shrug; he hadn’t said anything about my involvement in the lost relic. Which I should’ve known or I’d be receiving proportionally more of the numinlor’s glare and probably a pike-pointed escort to the dungeon.
The prince lounged back in his seat. “Kalima,” he drawled. “If you’d told us you were joining us, we would’ve saved you some kavé. As you know, the king himself has tasked us”—again with this we and us, I thought uneasily, quite the change for the solitary prince—“with conquering the horde, once and for all.”
“Impossible,” she snapped again, and I could’ve told him that sometimes insouciance was a poor choice compared to an obsequious smile and prudent retreat. “The only tool we have to reap the auras is the demon dragon itself, tainted as it is, and our only vessel to wield auras against the horde is you, for all your flaws.” She glared at him. When his mocking smile didn’t even flicker, her brow smoothed, and I stiffened for a more vicious attack. “And yet once again you desert your post to linger with lesser matters”—her gaze pinned Dyania in nasty judgment—“though you well know that such transient pleasures weaken your bond with the monster.” When she tilted her head, the lamplight on her bleached hair glowed like flames on winter-bleached bone. “Perhaps a reminder? I know Vreas is eager to find a way to make amends for losing Ormonde’s relic.”
I cast another wary glance at Lisel this time; would she defend her father by telling that I’d taken the whistle? But her gaze was fixed on the numinlor, face ashen except for the points of her cheekbones marked with angry color. I doubted her silent wrath was on the prince’s behalf, but disrespecting Lady Dyania was obviously more than the hartier would stomach.
Before Lisel could say something regrettable or Aric escalate to the point that he was marched off himself by the haloric guard, I cleared my throat. “Maybe we should ask for King Mikhalthe to guide us,” I said in a halting voice. “As savior of the Living Lands, radiating the amaranthine light that shines upon us all, he would know best, yes?”
Of course Kalima did not want the king involved. Whether he backed her or contradicted her, his words would still seem weightier than hers, which would irk her. But neither could she admit not wanting him around.
Her eyes narrowed. “He has other, more important matters to occupy him, child. We will not bother him with this bit of fantastical verse you believe will save the Living Lands.” She aimed a more fulminating glare at the prince. “You of all people should know better.”
Those words seemed most brutal of all. Maybe because they were true.
But his expression of bland indifference never faltered, as if her words were nothing compared to the others tortures he’d endured.
Whether it was the prince’s disregard or my suggestion to involve the king, the numinlor’s outrage seemed spent. After one more haughty glance around us, she turned her attention to Imbril. “See to it that all these old stories are put away. Tomorrow I will remind the king of his duties. And the night after, we invoke the Devouring.”
She swept out without waiting for a response from any of us.
We all looked at Imbril.
He collapsed into the chair farther from us. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “She came to my room last night and had so many questions. She kept asking…”
To my surprise, it was the prince who spoke first. “Not pleasant to be on the receiving end of the haloria’s interrogation,” he said, his tone not quite sympathetic but acknowledging. “Whether it’s words or whips.”
When the others turned their horrified gazes to him, he focused his attention on rolling the scrolls.
Grudgingly, I nodded at Imbril. “She might’ve used all the force of her words on you, but you obviously didn’t tell her I took the relic and destroyed it. If you had, I would be on the receiving end of that whip Prince Aric mentioned.”
Imbril slumped lower in his chair. “She…didn’t even really ask about the whistle. She wanted to know what the king thought we could do, what we’d found so far, what else we’re looking for.” He scrubbed both hands over his face. “I tried to explain our hopes for a miracle, but she wasn’t listening. As if that part didn’t matter. And I didn’t know what to tell her that wouldn’t make things worse.”
I didn’t want to, but I actually felt bad for the lor. How strange to be so sheltered that he’d never learned to properly lie. Amazing he’d survived this long.
Maybe we’d see how that worked out for him.
The lady stayed in her seat, her gaze lowered in front of her. “We have a day and a night to knot a new thread to this unraveling mess.”
And if we didn’t, then the lady and the prince would be right back to where we started.
Lisel stood protectively at Dyania’s chair. “Battles have been won in less time than that.”
“And lost in even less,” the prince murmured.
Furious, I slammed my palms down on the table. The carved wood was much too heavy to shift at my touch, but everyone else jumped—except Aric, of course, though he did slant a glance my way.
I glared at him. “You’ve joined us. You’re part of this now. So stop with the miserable muttering.”
He sat back with the same insolence he’d directed at Kalima, but his jaw was tight. “You’d rather I lied, little thief? I thought that was your place in this doomed endeavor.”
“But it’s not doomed.” Dyania lifted her gaze, dark and light fixed on the prince. “We’re not dead yet, and that means we still have a chance.” Her focus shifted to me with a faint smile. “You weren’t lying about that, were you, Fei?”
I swallowed against the tightness in my throat. “Not about that, my lady.”
For a long, frozen moment, Aric just stared at us. Then he shoved to his feet. “There are worse fates than death.” He spun on his heel and stalked out of the library.
In the tense silence, I scraped one hand over my face with a sigh. “Neh, I only said he couldn’t mutter, not that he couldn’t stalk away in princely disdain. My fault.”
Lisel made a little noise that might’ve been a laugh.
Gracefully, Dyania rose too. “He’s not wrong to go. After all, it’s late, and the numinlor gave us an order. I wouldn’t be surprised if she sends a guard around to enforce it, so let us reconvene in the morning.”
“I’ll put everything away,” Imbril said humbly. “I might not’ve found an answer, but I know where it all goes.”
Lisel nodded. “I’ll stay and explain what Prince Aric told us.”
I gave her a look; she had been annoyed with Imbril more than once herself. But she only met my gaze and inclined her head to the lady.
So I accompanied Dyania back to the Sevaare chambers. She paced along pensively, her focus on the woven runner that softened the stone floor. As if some brightly colored spectrum threads could disguise the truth we were trapped in a mountain because demons had chased a long-dead king this far.
“At least I can see Morowyn again,” she said. “And I’ll be with her…no matter what.”
I held back a shudder. I didn’t want to see her like her sister—presupposing I wouldn’t be dead myself, if Zik was right about the haloria using the Chosen Ones’ attendants to thicken the Devouring like an unsatisfyingly weak soup. Despite my snapping at the prince—or maybe because of it—my hope was sadder and more withered than the fading sleepers and winter tubers combined.
I’d watched Zik enough that I could play the lady’s maid. I prepared the privacy chamber, which had impressed me so much before but couldn’t compare to the bubbling bath in the prince’s lair, and assisted her into the big bed.
“Leave the light on,” she murmured when I went to the last lamp. “It will be lonely without Zik.”
I nodded. “I’ll stay.”
“No.” She rolled to her side. “You needn’t. You’re too restless anyway.”
I bit my lip. “Just until you fall asleep then.”
When she didn’t answer, I took that as acquiescence and settled myself on the trundle. Not wanting to seem too restless, I made myself lie absolutely still as her breath evened and deepened. But she was right that I couldn’t stop my mind from wandering, and when I knew she was asleep, I slipped out of the bed chamber.
I made no noise as I put the main room to rights, not that Zik had left much to do. I hoped Nenzo appreciated the extra set of helping hands. I hoped no one was helping Aric, with his unfailing faith in the worst befalling us.
With nothing else to do and my anger and the kavé burning acidly in my guts, I set the latch to lock behind me and left the quarters.
He was coming down the obsidian spire just as I stepped through the black-arched doorway of carven scales.
We both froze.
“Are you coming to apologize?” Not a mutter but a growl.
I stiffened. It wasn’t fair that meeting in this location meant I could only be returning to his lair while he could be heading out anywhere. “I was coming to hear an apology.”
He crossed his arms over his chest, staring down his nose at me. “For translating the scrolls for you and giving you foolish hope?”
“For ripping it apart like a raptor on a rabbit.” I glared at him. “How can we keep going if you won’t throw us the tiniest bone?”
His lips twitched. “You stole the bone. And ate it.”
“I didn’t—” I threw up my hands. “It was just dust. Anyway, stop pretending to not get what I mean.”
“No muttering and no deliberate misunderstanding? Would you take everything from me? What will I have left once you’ve stripped me bare?”
“Skulking about the High Keep?” I lifted an eyebrow, refusing to picture him as he’d looked stripped bare. “Although I suggest you take a cloak, at least.”
“You took that too.”
I pursed my lips. That was…true. After the dragon flight and warming bath, I had ended up keeping his cloak. I ignored that. “So why are you skulking?”
“I want to know why Kalima is so angry about an old poem.”
I tilted my head. “To be fair to the numinlor, she’s angry about a lot of things.”
He snorted. “Yes. And many of those I’ve already learned and have the scars to remind me. The poem, though, that is different. I want to take another look at that scroll.”
I spun on my heel. “Let’s go.”
He balked. “Not together. I can’t join you if I’m going to mutter, remember?”
I rolled my eyes. “I just didn’t want you savaging our hope when that’s all we really have to get us through our darkest hours—besides kavé.”
He stood there long enough that I thought maybe he was actually going to refuse to move if I went along, his clouded gaze fixed on the passageway to the palace, but then he said in a low voice, not a mutter but the broken tone of halting memory, “Somehow it doesn’t hurt as much if I do it to myself first.”
My chest tightened. “I’m sorry.”
He glanced at me. “I thought you were coming here for my apology.”
“Mostly I was going to yell at you, which would be silly and wrong since you’ve been through so much worse. That’s what I’m sorry for.”
After a moment, he shook his head. “That a rough little stray like you feels for a prince of the realm…”
It rankled, but I knew he was insulting me for the same reason he refused to hope. “Muttering, misunderstanding, and now maligning. See where it gets you, but it won’t get you to the library for that scroll alone.”
I stalked away, because I could do that as well as any prince. And he followed in silence.
The library was dark when we got there, and only one of the lamps had enough fuel left to relight. I did that while Aric—who apparently had better vision in the dark than any thief—went to the shallow drawers that had held the scrolls.
At his harsh exhalation, not quite a curse, I hurried over with the sputtering lamp. “What—?”
The drawer was empty.
So were the others he checked, and though I quickly aimed the lamp around the rest of the big room, the scrolls were gone.
“She took them,” he said. “All of them.”
“But why? They were here all along, and she could have them whenever she wished.”
“She wished for us to not have them.”
I blinked. “But…she is in charge of the haloria. They want us to defeat the horde.” I hesitated. “Don’t they?”
He gave me a look I couldn’t decipher through the icy scars. “How do you want me to answer when I can’t mutter or malign?”
I wished this once I could misunderstand.
“Where would she take them?” I drew myself up even though my knees felt wobbly. “Maybe we can…” I trailed off as his look became more clear—very definitely disdain.
“Do you intend to rob the haloria?”
I wrinkled my nose. “It wouldn’t be robbery. These are the histories of the people of the Living Lands. And we are its people.”
He laughed, actually laughed, at me, and it almost sounded genuine. “I would love to see you debate the numinlor and the king.” Then his smile slipped. “Although we may have the chance tomorrow.”
I shuddered. “And I thought Orton was bad.”
He lifted one eyebrow. “Who is Orton?”
“The notorious felon who rules the worst alleys in Sevaare.” I sighed. “He’s the reason I joined the cavalcade of Chosen coming here. It seemed a good opportunity compared to the dead-end alley where I’d found myself.”
The prince squinted at me, though I had evidence he could see fine in the gloom. “He’s the reason, or you gave him a reason? Or should I say, did you take a reason?”
With great dignity, I announced, “I prefer not to say since it’s a source of regret and discontent to me that I had to leave all my accumulations behind. Although I suppose it’s as if I purified myself in the journey.”
“As if.” He snorted. “Tonight has proven another dead-end alley. But you apparently think tomorrow is another day. Until then, though, I should see you back to your lady. Whatever power remained in Ormonde’s relic is gone, and if no one has betrayed you to Mikhalthe or Kalima, you’ll be safe enough now.”
I hesitated. Some part of me had been so set on charging up the spiraling black passage to his lair that it felt strange to fall short of my supposed purpose.
Why did I want to be closer to the dragon anyway? The whistling bone-dust wheeze in my voice had cleared and probably hadn’t ever been enough to command a demon, whatever my aspirations might’ve been. Not that I’d sought to save a kingdom or rule it or hear my name in a ballad or…
Frowning at my own reluctance, I tagged along as he started out into the corridor. This late there was no one around, and the shadowy quiet felt strangely intimate. Even more strangely, he seemed content to shorten his stride to keep me at his side.
“These are thieving hours,” I said. “Are you quite sure you don’t want to go searching for the scrolls?”
He glanced down at me, a faint quirk to the corner of his mouth. “I have someone I can ask about the poem and who might provide other avenues of exploration less dusty than disintegrating bones and scrolls. And I probably shouldn’t encourage your larceny anyway.” After a few more steps, he added, “Why would you want me along? Isn’t thieving a solitary endeavor?”
I started to make some comment echoing what he’d said in the sleepers’ chamber about us being doomed together, but then paused. He’d told me about his terrible childhood. How could I joke in return? “In the alleys, hope and trust were dearer than coin and sweeter than wintryberry—and more essential than either. Even after I was old enough and big enough to defend myself, I always drank more merrily and slept deeper with a friend or two at my side.”
He was quiet another few steps. “And yet still, when you fled Sevaare, you did so alone.”
I too kept my silence for half a hallway before answering. “I’d brought trouble upon myself by hoping and trusting too much. I suppose there’s a balance in that just as in auras. But I didn’t want anyone else to suffer my fate, should it go badly.” I grimaced. “I’ve never really had my toss of the hedrons matter to anyone else, and maybe I should’ve had more faith in them instead of running away. But what I felt the one time I followed behind a friend to the gallows, that I would not wish even on Orton and his headthumpers.”
The prince tilted his head thoughtfully. “From the time I was taken into the royal household, I saw how some people balanced other people’s fates. Before I was taken away to my own doom, sometimes I envied Mikhalthe for mattering so much. When I realized I’d be the balance to his power, it was too late to escape.”
We’d come to the colonnade of arched windows, but when I glanced out, tonight there was no eerie lightning, no drifting snow, just the empty night. “I’ve been jealous of Ani too, even knowing her fate.” I shook my head. “Clearly I am unbalanced.”
Aric let out a sound, not quite a snort, more like a sigh. “She’s kind and keen, with a striking beauty, noble in the truest sense of the word, and strong enough to wield her gifts on behalf of the rest of us.”
With only partly exaggerated exasperation, I scowled. “Heyo, I know she’s a paragon of Chosen Oneness. I already said I was jealous. I don’t need a reminder of the many, many reasons why.”
He glanced at me with a wry grin. “I was contrasting with myself.”
“Oh.” I slanted a glance back at him. “At least you can read old dead languages and she can’t.”
He definitely snorted at me. “Shall I thank Lor Berindo who was Mikhalthe’s history tutor and mine before I was sent to the dragon?”
“I think no one would blame you for cursing everyone who watched you go.”
We passed a little stone alcove where a glass-paned lamp cast enough light that anyone roaming the night wouldn’t walk into a wall. In that clear glow, the prince’s icy eyes burned. “I cursed every single one of them. And I think those curses reflected back at me every time I screamed.” He let out a shuddering breath. “I think that’s why I’m here now.”
With a quick half-step, I got ahead of him, forcing him into a collision course. “I’m your curse?”
“Definitely.” He paused. “But maybe… I didn’t see it at first, but maybe in joining you, I’ll finally find a way out.”
I tilted my head. “I’ve never been someone’s guiding light.”
“You’ve never found yourself in such darkness as this.” As he took that last half-step toward me, the lamplit gleam of his eyes sent a spark jumping through me. “You told me you wanted to forget, when you cupped your hands around my face and looked at me, when you…kissed me.” His tone turned harsh, grating, “I cannot forget. That kiss haunts me.”
It hadn’t even been much of a kiss, just a brush of my mouth over his. And he couldn’t forget it? A flutter pulsed through my blood, like the restless shifting of dark wings. There was a hint of wicked exultance in it, that a cold and dangerous prince should be moved by my touch.
My fingers had never curled so yearningly over any jewel.
“I can make you forget that kiss,” I said softly as I leaned toward his big body, closing the distance between us.
He stared down at me. “You want to kiss me again.”
I smirked. “You are at least as keen as Lady Dyania.”
“You’ve kissed her too?”
“No. She has different feelings about touch.” I hesitated, my boldness bleeding away. “You should talk to her if you want—”
“No. I didn’t mean I want her touch.” He averted his face. “Although it makes the thought of the Devouring that much worse.”
My burgeoning itch utterly squelched by that reminder, I reached out impulsively to press my fingers against his broad chest. “If we find this weapon against the horde that isn’t you and the dragon, you’ll never have to do that again.”
He looked down at my hand. “We don’t have enough time.”
“But we have some.”
“And you’ve always found a way to make do with less than enough.” He settled his fingertips over mine. “I suppose that’s why you were willing to kiss me.”
I wrinkled my nose at him. “To steal a little more?”
“Because you’ve gone hungry yet managed to survive anyway.” He curled his hand a little, tucking beneath mine. “But I can’t give you anything, Feinan. I wasn’t old enough to drink merrily or…or sleep beside anyone before I went to the dragon.”
He meant he was untouched in that way, a virgin.
“I can feed the dragon,” he said, “but I fear I’d leave you still hungry.”
The edge of regret in his voice cut me deeper. “It can be a sharing, not just a sacrifice.” I closed my fingers around his, pulling our hands away from his chest as I took a slow step back. “But though it’s true enough I want to kiss you again, I’ll wait until you want it too.”
He didn’t let go of my hand. “How would I even know? How can I dare reach for something I’ve never thought I could want?”
The grin I cast him this time was wry. “You lash yourself to a dragon to fight demons. This isn’t too much scarier.”
He narrowed his eyes. “You have no idea.”
“Oh no, how could I, a petty thief with a price on her head—though not a significant one, insultingly—who wishes only to kiss a dreadmarked prince?” At my gentle gibe, he angled his head, shying away, and I tugged at him. “Shall I show you?”
After a heartbeat, he nodded.
Raising our joined hands, I brushed my mouth across his knuckles. The patchwork of old scars scuffed my lips. Punching demons or the walls of the cells that had restrained him? His indrawn breath was a faint hiss—not pain, exactly, but a startlement at the sensation that was not unlike hurting. I knew it because I felt the tender ache in my own body.
Turning his hand over in mine, I spread his fingers wide and looked down at the thick calluses and yet more scars. Knuckle abrasions were offensive attacks, but the vulnerable flesh of his palm was marked with defensive wounds—long healed, maybe, but obviously the memories remained in the racing of his pulse under my thumb. I could at least give him another memory to hold, even if I’d told him at that first kiss that all I’d wanted was to forget.
I centered a kiss in the cup of his hand, letting my breath feather over the blood seething through the veins in his wrist, arrowing for his heart.
His answering exhalation was harsher than before, not quite an oath.
I let our loosely tangled fingers descend slowly between us, still linked. “While you are choosing what to reach for, you can think about that—and whether you might want more.”
He stood unmoving, silent, though the flare of his nostrils gave him the look of a hart ready to bolt away.
Reluctantly, I let him go. “I should get back to my lady. With the numinlor so suspicious of our studies, I fear she might sneak the Chosen away with the scrolls.”
His hand, the one I’d kissed, clenched in a fist. “If you go missing, I’ll find you.”
My heart felt seized in that grasp. “No one has ever bothered to look for me.” I swallowed. “I suppose no one ever wanted to.”
“I would not stop, not until I had you back.” His words thrummed through me, promise and menace weaving like light and shadow. “You may have been an unnamed ward of Sevaare’s streets before, but you belong to me now.”
The ferocity pulsed in the shadowed hall, as if the declaration sought to etch itself like a blackening fire across the purity of the beautiful blessed tiles.
As a thief, to be fair I felt I should share some hard truths—and essential vulnerabilities—about possessiveness. But maybe now wasn’t the time to change my mind about being fair.
I entwined my own fingers to stop myself from reaching for him again. “Is it madness to say I’m glad that at least no one will brave the dragon’s aerie to bother you?”
After a moment, his lips quirked. “Madness, perhaps, but…not wrong. I will see you tomorrow.”
I wasn’t sure if that was a question or a command, but I nodded. “Good night, shadow prince.”
“Good night, little thief.”
Why that should sound like an endearment and not an insult now, I had no idea, but I slinked back to the Sevaare chambers with none the wiser and a strange, dangerous little glow like glimmers of eldritch lightning in my heart.